


A Little Bird Told Me

by Fyre



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Canon Compliant, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-06
Updated: 2019-06-06
Packaged: 2020-04-11 22:11:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19118701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fyre/pseuds/Fyre
Summary: Faced with the wrath of Heaven and Hell, an angel and a demon seek refuge together, knowing that their only hope of survival is the cryptic prophecy of a long-dead witch.





	A Little Bird Told Me

**Author's Note:**

> This is entirely the fault of Michael Sheen, David Tennant and the props department of Good Omens.

Aziraphale gazed up at the towering building.

In all the years they had known one another, he had never been able to allow himself to visit Crowley’s home. Safer, he had insisted. Not proper. What if their enemies saw them? They couldn’t be seen together. Not at all.

And yet, now that he thought back, Crowley had never once refused to cross the threshold of an angel’s domain. He’d lost count of the number of nights they had spent in the bookshop together, laughing, talking and sometimes, even working. Was Crowley braver, Aziraphale wondered, or more foolish? Or perhaps simply more honest with himself. 

“Don’t need to look so worried, angel.” Crowley grinned at him, but not as widely as usual. Thought he tried not to do it often, Aziraphale couldn’t help feeling the tenor of the demon’s emotions. He was _nervous_. “S’just a flat. No sulphur or pits or torture or anything.”

Aziraphale’s heart ached suddenly. “I’m sure it’s lovely.” He smiled tentatively. “Are you sure you don’t mind if I stay?”

Crowley huffed dramatically, but Aziraphale could tell that even that was for show. “Would I ask if I minded?” He snapped his fingers and the lock clicked open. “C’mon, angel.” He strode in and didn’t look back as he headed towards the lift.

For a moment, Aziraphale lingered on the step.

A lifetime, millennia, of being so sure he and Crowley would – should – could never be more than passing acquaintances was a hard habit to break. 

Centuries of discretion and hasty meetings and secret arrangements were out in the open now. They were friends. Of course they were. They always had been. And a friend didn’t loiter on the steps of a friend’s home, not when he had been offered shelter and hospitality.

Even though Crowley didn’t look back, Aziraphale saw the tension leave his shoulders the moment Aziraphale’s shoes tapped on the marble floor of the lobby. 

“It’s not where I expected you to live,” Aziraphale finally said, as the lift slid smoothly upwards. 

“Oh?” Crowley pulled his glasses off, folding in the legs with a click-click. One side of his mouth turned up. “What were you expecting?”

Aziraphale glanced around at the gleaming glass lift. Shiny and sleek, like his car and his glasses. He had to smile. “You know, I don’t know. But now that I see it, it makes all the sense in the world.”

Crowley rolled his eyes with one of those rare, quiet laughs that Aziraphale had come to be so fond of. “Still an idiot, aren’t you, angel?”

“I believe the phrase,” Aziraphale said primly, “is that ‘it takes one to know one’.”

Crowley laughed, shaking his head, as the lift came to a stop. “Come on.” He led the way into a broad corridor and Aziraphale didn’t even have to ask which door was his.

“Not… subtle, is it?” he observed.

“Eh?” Crowley looked around, puzzled.

Aziraphale uncurled one finger towards the doorbell. “You. Not subtle.”

Crowley’s grin flashed across his face. “I like to give people a fair warning.”

“Well,” Aziraphale said with a snort, as Crowley snapped the door open. “We both know that’s a lie.”

The flat – oddly, for a moment – reminded Aziraphale of Heaven: all high ceilings and glass walls with a sprawling view of the city beyond. It was a strange thought, especially knowing that once, so long ago, Crowley would have been there and seen it. 

“Got a guest room,” Crowley was saying as he led Aziraphale through a succession of doors, past strange vases and statues and what looked like a slightly charred ornament of a bird. “I think.”

“You think?”

Crowley shrugged. “Never had a guest before.”

It was as if a tremendous hand had squeezed around Aziraphale’s heart. All these years, centuries, wasted, keeping Crowley carefully at arm’s length and never once had he stopped to consider how alone Crowley might be. The bookshop had been a place they shared with drinks and laughter, but this vast, sprawling flat, so polished and pristine, was lying empty.

“Oh.” The sound didn’t encapsulate the magnitude of the emotions smothering him. He had to pause, pressing a hand to his chest, to try and catch his breath.

Crowley must have – as always – noticed. He spun around and was by Aziraphale’s side in a blink. “You all right?” he demanded, searching Aziraphale’s face.

Aziraphale nodded, trying to swallow the lump in his throat. “I’m so very sorry.”

Not for the first time, Crowley stared at him in confusion. “What for?”

It took a lot more effort than he anticipated to find wit and words to reply. “For… for not coming to visit you.” He managed a brittle smile. “I was a dreadful friend.”

Crowley gaped at him, mouth hanging open. For a few seconds, he slowly swayed his head from side to side as if trying to understand what Aziraphale was talking about, then exploded out with, “You are _such_ an angel!” He shook his head, sighing. “I know why you didn’t come. I know, all right? It’s not about you or me. It was them. It was what they told you and you wanted to believe it.” He spread his arms in a shrug. “It’s just a place.”

“Just a place,” Aziraphale echoed, lowering his hand from his chest. He took a steadying breath. “I _am_ still sorry, though.”

Crowley offered one of those rarer, smaller smiles. “Yeah. I know you are.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “And I found the guest room.”

Aziraphale nodded with an unsteady smile. “Thank you.”

Crowley snorted as he swung around to lead the way. “You haven’t seen it yet.”

There was playfulness in his tone, gentle reassurance that Aziraphale wished he could match. Still, he had to try. “Well, I know there’s no sulphur, so that’s a good start.”

Golden eyes and a grin gleamed over Crowley’s shoulder. He threw the door open with a flourish a stage magician would be proud of. The room beyond him was nearly exactly the same as Aziraphale’s own room above the bookshop, right down to the lovely brass bedstead and white cotton sheets. There were even some books on the bedside table. It looked like _home_. 

The emotion in the air was so tangible. It shouldn’t have been, but it was, and Aziraphale touched a hand to his chest again. “It’s perfect.”

Crowley waved his words away. “Don’t say I’m not good to… wait…” he frowned. “Don’t say I’m good… Ah, fuck it. Say whatever you like.”

Aziraphale nodded, approaching the bed and touching the polished metal of the frame. There was so much to think about – to worry about. They had made powerful enemies on both sides, but after so many days of frantic rushing about, a moment of quiet was overwhelmingly tempting. 

“Would–” He began, then hesitated. Crowley was leaning against the doorframe with one shoulder, but looked as if he might twist and vanish out into the halls of his flat. That would be… normal, Crowley disappearing out into the night, but Aziraphale ached at the thought of it. “Please will you stay with me?” 

Crowley stared at him, unblinking. “With you?” He sounded as unsure as Aziraphale felt.

Whatever they had, it wasn’t what they had before. Something new. Different. Good. But so delicate and fragile, it still felt like it might break apart.

Aziraphale managed a frail smile. “I’d rather not be alone just now.”

“In case they come looking?” Crowley shook his head. “They won’t. Not here. Not after what happened last time.”

“No.” Aziraphale darted out his tongue to wet his suddenly dry lips. “I– I’d rather not be without you for a little while. If that’s all right.”

It felt like they were balanced on a knife-edge.

“If it’s all right?” Crowley tilted his head, gazing at him. 

Aziraphale curled his hands together. Not in prayer, of course, but there was comfort in the gesture, and when Crowley shrugged and threw a small, lop-sided smile at him, he felt like he could breathe again. “Thank you.”

Crowley rolled his eyes, but the smile was still there, lurking around his lips. “You’re soft, angel,” he scoffed, but he was already halfway out of his jacket. 

“Well, yes.” Aziraphale slipped his own jacket off too. “We both know that.”

Crowley considered him, then looked at the bed. “Which side?”

Aziraphale sat down on the nearest part of the bed. “Ours?” he suggested.

Crowley snorted aloud and threw himself down on the other side of the bed, sprawling out, all arms and legs. “Don’t know why I put up with you.” He slanted a look at Aziraphale. “’Specially when you don’t even like me.”

Aziraphale stretched out beside him, rolling onto his side. He folded one arm under his head as he gazed at Crowley. “You’re not going to forget that, are you?”

Crowley wrinkled his nose at the ceiling. “Naaaaaah.” He tucked one hand behind his head and grinned at Aziraphale. “Not often I get something to make you feel guilty.”

For the first time in a long time – maybe ever – Aziraphale laughed without any care or fear for what anyone else might think of him – of them. He reached out and squeezed Crowley’s arm gently through his sleeve. “Do shut up, my dear.”

Crowley’s expression changed then, to something warmer and softer. “Whatever you want, angel.”

In that moment, Aziraphale realised that he already had exactly what he wanted and whatever happened, he was going to do whatever he had to, even it meant facing Heaven and Hell, to keep it.

____________________________________________________

It was still dark when Crowley stirred.

He glanced at his watch. 

Only the next morning, thankfully. Nothing like that nap in the middle ages. Said a lot about the century before, that did. Go for a kip after three quarters of the 14th – awful century. Nothing to write home about – and wake up ninety-nine years, eight months and seven days later to a commendation for the _fantastic_ work you’re doing in Spain. 

Naps were risky things. You never knew what would happen while you were under. 

Like waking up in a bed with white cotton sheets and no bloody angel.

Crowley’s heart twisted up in his chest. “Angel…” He scrambled off the bed, spinning around, searching the room. Nothing more than books and furniture. Definitely not under the covers or under the bed or anywhere else. Aziraphale was gone. The bed was empty. He was gone. Again. “Aziraphale!”

“Yes?”

Crowley froze, a handful of bedsheets gripped – torn – in his fists. Voice from somewhere else in the flat. Hell’s sake, the door was open. Why hadn’t he noticed the door was open? He dropped to sheets back on the bed and stalked out into the hallway, trying to stop his hands from shaking.

“Having a nice walk?” he demanded, when he found his runaway guest, down by the stone lectern in the far end of the flat. The way he was standing, the bird’s outstretched wings almost looked like his own. 

Aziraphale seemed lost in a world of his own. “What?” He turned, blinking and ruffled. “Oh. Yes. Sorry.” He smiled sheepishly. “I don’t sleep often. Or much at all really.” He was turning a scrap of paper over and over in his hands. “I– she was right about everything, you see. And this warning came to me, so I can’t help thinking it was– it’s for us. I know it’s for us.”

The last words of the Nutter book, Crowley remembered.

He reached down and plucked the scrap from Aziraphale’s hands, frowning at it. “‘Playing with fire’,” he quoted. “Well, yeah. We just took on Hell. Pretty famous for their fire, down there. Not exactly rocket science to figure that out. We’ll be lucky if we’re both not raked across the coals. And the embers. And the inferno.”

“Mm.” Aziraphale nodded. “The thing is that she’s very accurate.” He laughed ruefully. “She even gave me the Antichrist’s phone number.”

Crowley blinked at him. “No.”

“Oh yes.” Aziraphale was twisting his hands together. “But this one… this one, I can’t quite work out what she’s saying. It’s like reading a cryptic clue for a crossword. Obvious once you know the answer, but I can’t make sense of the rest of it.”

Crowley stared at it again. _When alle is sayed and all is done, ye must choose your faces wisely for soon enough, you will be playing with fyre_. “Do you think I’m meant to turn back into a snake? The choosing your face line.”

Aziraphale hummed distractedly. He was walking in small anxious circles on the floor, his brow creased in worried thought. He reached out to brace one hand against the lectern, then frowned at it, pulling his hand back and wiping ash from his fingers.

“Shouldn’t touch that,” Crowley said a helpful few seconds too late. “Bit of smoke damage.” 

Aziraphale wrinkled his nose at him. “Most people would clean their possessions.”

“I liked the authenticity,” Crowley sniffed. “Still has that nice bombed-out smell to it.”

“Bombed out…” Aziraphale stared at the bird. “Good Lord. It isn’t…” He darted a look at Crowley with that lovely wide-eyed expression of bewildered wonder he sometimes had. “1941? From the church? You kept it? All this time?”

Crowley knew he couldn’t blush. He was a demon for Satan’s sake. “Well…” He shrugged one shoulder. “No one else was using it.”

Aziraphale looked at the carved bird again, then smiled, dimples appearing in his cheeks. “A souvenir?” he said softly. 

Now, Crowley was definitely adamantly sure demons couldn’t blush. It was just a bit hot. “Shut up,” he grumbled fondly and shoved the piece of paper back at the angel. “We’ve got a riddle to solve and it’s not like I can just drop a bomb on some Nazis and their two-faced accomplice.”

Aziraphale stared at him, clutching the scrap of paper against his chest. “What did you say?”

“Bombing Nazis? Well, I could. There’s a new batch poking their heads out the woodwork, but I don’t have any convenient bombs just ly–”

“No, no, no!” Aziraphale waved a hand. “Not about the bombing. About their accomplice.”

“Their two-faced…” There was a worryingly manic look creeping onto the angel’s face. “Oh. Oh no. I’ve seen that look before.”

“It’s the answer!” Aziraphale said excitedly. “She’s the answer!”

Crowley was more than a little bit confused. “A Nazi?”

“No!” Aziraphale beamed at him. “A double-agent! Pretending to be one thing, but actually being another!”

“You’ve lost me.” Crowley shook his head.

“We know they’ll be coming for us,” Aziraphale said with a note of impatience in his voice. “I don’t doubt our own sides will both want their pound of flesh. And if I know Gabriel and his little gang, they will want to make sure it can never happen again. That means a permanent punishment.” He grimaced, making a small choppy gesture below his chin. “Completely permanent.”

Crowley winced, nodding. Killing Ligur was pretty bad, but defying Satan definitely wasn’t going to win him any popularity contests, no matter what credit he’d built up in six millennia. “Yeah, downstairs too.”

“And we both know there are only a few ways to truly destroy angels and demons. Holy water for you…”

A horrible image presented itself and Crowley’s insides squirmed horribly. “And hellfire for you.” He shook his head. “They’d have to work together for that.”

A shade of pain crossed Aziraphale’s features. “You saw Gabriel’s face. I think he would consider these extenuating circumstances.”

Beelzebub would probably agree to it as well. The fact they’d made them look stupid would be more of an excuse than the fact they stopped Armageddon. Crowley ran a hand over his face. “Right. So they come after us and want to kill us. None of this is explaining what your Nazi girl has to do with it.”

Aziraphale met his eyes. “What if…” He paused as if giving voice to the thought might destroy it. “What if they take the wrong person?”

“Wha–?” Crowley’s frown deepened. “I mean, they’re pretty stupid, but I don’t think even Hastur would make that mistake.”

“Not,” Aziraphale said excitedly, “if _we_ are the double-agents!”

Crowley screwed up his face. “I don’t think I’m awake enough for this conversation. What the Heaven are you talking about?”

“We switch places! You can tolerate the hellfire and I can tolerate the holy water.” He beamed. “We choose our faces wisely for the situation.”

“Switch… places.” Crowley slowly shook his head. “That would never work. Even with the best glamour in place, they’d smell us a mile off.”

“Not–” The manic gleam in Aziraphale’s eyes was really quite worrying, “–if we… inhabited one another’s bodies.”

For what felt like an eternity, Crowley stared at him. “You what?”

“Us. We…” The angel made a vague gesture between them. “Like a possession, only we each take the other’s body.”

Crowley pinched the bridge of his nose. “What happened to angel-demon-probably-explode?” he inquired. “That was what you said, wasn’t it?”

“I was discorporated,” Aziraphale said, flapping a hand. “I wasn’t thinking straight. I… think we would be all right.”

Crowley tried to count to ten to keep from yelling. He managed to get to six. “You _think_? This isn’t exactly a situation where we get a second try if it goes wrong!”

Aziraphale nodded. “I know.” He sighed, twisting his hands together in front of him. Nice to see he was at least as worried about it as Crowley himself. “I just– they’re coming for us. We both know they are. I would rather take the chance and do this with you than simply wait for them to kill me.”

For a split-second, Crowley had the sensation of freefall again, as if the world he knew had dropped out from under him. “You could _die_.” The word caught in his throat. “I can’t see that again, angel. I _can’t_.”

The world came sharply back into focus when Aziraphale reached out and caught his hand.

“You won’t.” He smiled that warm, familiar smile that filled up Crowley’s world like a sunrise. “I promise.”

Crowley looked down at their hands, Aziraphale’s soft fingertips brushing against his. He’d’ve been happy, he thought, just to stay like that for a while. Just them and – for once – nothing in between them. Not Heaven. Not Hell. Nothing. 

“I think,” he finally said, “you’re just saying that because if this kills you, it’s probably going to kill me as well. I see what you did there. Nice loophole, angel.”

“Oh!” Aziraphale all but pouted and moved to pull his hand back.

Crowley caught his fingers before he could break contact. “Well,” he said, running his thumb along Aziraphale’s knuckles. He raised his eyes to meet Aziraphale’s and when he grinned, it felt all right. “If we’re going to go out, we’ll do it in style.”

**Author's Note:**

> I told myself I would just watch the show. I liked the book well enough, but not enough to fic it. That, I told myself, was what the show would be to me. I was a deluded idiot :D


End file.
